Elon Musk Unveils Master Plan

Elon Musk has released his second master plan for his electric car company Tesla, and he has some pretty ambitious goals.

Musk has done this once before, in 2006, where he outlined his goals for the company and his plans to build what eventually became the Model X and Model S cars.

Now, Elon wants to create a “solar-roof-with-battery product that just works.” This vision, Musk explained, is why he is seeking to merge his solar energy company, Solar City, into Tesla.

Musk also outlined his vision for Tesla owners to put their self driving Tesla into a sharing system.

“You will also be able to add your car to the Tesla shared fleet just by tapping a button on the Tesla phone app and have it generate income for you while you’re at work or on holiday, significantly offsetting and at times potentially exceeding the monthly loan or lease cost, Musk wrote. “This dramatically lowers the true cost of ownership to the point where almost anyone could own a Tesla.”

Musk also teased at his plans to dominate the entire car market, not just a fragment. “Today, Tesla addresses two relatively small segments of premium sedans and SUVs, Musk wrote. “With the Model 3, a future compact SUV and a new kind of pickup truck, we plan to address most of the consumer market.”

Musk also took a second to rail against those who are calling for their somewhat controversial Autopilot feature to be disabled.

It would no more make sense to disable Tesla’s Autopilot, as some have called for, than it would to disable autopilot in aircraft, after which our system is named, Musk wrote. “It is also important to explain why we refer to Autopilot as “beta”. This is not beta software in any normal sense of the word. Every release goes through extensive internal validation before it reaches any customers. It is called beta in order to decrease complacency and indicate that it will continue to improve (Autopilot is always off by default). Once we get to the point where Autopilot is approximately 10 times safer than the US vehicle average, the beta label will be removed.”